


Rodeo and Ranch: The Message

by The Manwell (Manniness)



Series: Rodeo and Ranch [2]
Category: Gundam Wing
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-20
Updated: 2017-04-20
Packaged: 2018-10-21 09:26:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10682457
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Manniness/pseuds/The%20Manwell
Summary: Bull rider, Duo Maxwell, finds a reason for one more ride.Duo POVTakes place during the days leading up to the North American Bull Riders Championship.SPOILERS for "Rodeo and Ranch" up through Part 8: Heavyarms.  Plus minor spoilers for Part 9: First Kiss and Part 11: History Lessons.





	Rodeo and Ranch: The Message

**Author's Note:**

> Theme music: “Come November” by Thriving Ivory

I’d never expected bull riding to be a blast.  When I’d signed Howard’s contract and handed over my entire life for nine God damned months, I’d known it was going to stink worse than pig shit on fire.  At the time, it had seemed fitting.  Like penance.  For what, though, I couldn’t say.  Even now.

But I surely had not expected to meet someone like Trowa Barton.

God, did I miss him.  In my whole life, I’d never met someone I didn’t have to hide something from.

Well, not that there wasn’t a whole wagon-load of shit that I hadn’t told him.  Yet.  But I would.  I reckoned I would.  Sooner rather than later.

If I could just get through a few more nights.

I stared at the hotel entertainment card dispenser.  I’d already checked the pay-per-view TV listings.  With a classy joint like this, of course they offered gay porn.  Hell, they had everything.  Pret’near.  All a guest needed was a pre-paid card and a fella was good to go.

I was desperate enough to be standing here with a five dollar bill in hand, giving it serious consideration.  I knew it would be a hot but hollow experience.  It would only make me miss Trowa more.  Which was kind of hard to imagine, to be completely honest.

God, I hoped he was OK.  Food poisoning, Meiran had said.  I wished I could be there for him, damn it.

Or rather, damn _me_ for signing that fucking contract.

If I hadn’t signed it, I could have spent the last five months — maybe more — being his lover.  I could have kissed him in the cantina.  Could have put my arm around him at rallies.  Could have teased us both by fishing for loose change in his jeans pockets when I had a hankering for a Cherry Coke from the vending machine.  All of the attention I could have given him.  I ached with the loss.  The unfairness of it.

He deserved so much more than I’d given him.

He deserved a hell of a lot more than what I could have given him despite the damn contract.  Maybe Howard would have forgiven me if I’d gotten caught, but the sponsors were another story.  And without sponsors, the contract was useless.  It would have meant a hell of a lot more than just however many months of my life down the drain.

Despite the risks, I’d still let myself imagine it: quick, secretive skin-on-skin whenever I could manage to sneak away in the dead of the night; noisy, crowded evenings at the cantina trying not to look his way as he stood back while I flirted and danced with the lady fans.  Hell, if he’d sat at the bar watching me while I’d had to lay on the charm week after week forcing myself to ignore him…

No.  Hell, no.

It would have killed me to do that to him.  It turned my stomach to even think it.

Keeping things on the back burner had been the only option.

I still couldn’t believe that Trowa had agreed to wait.

Was still waiting.

The thought hit me like a bucket of ice-cold water.  What the hell was I doing?  Trowa — loyal, understanding, smart, sexy, brave, gorgeous Trowa — was back at Bloom’s waiting for me to come back to him and I was five dollars away from a cheap thrill?

Disgusted with myself, I turned away from the machine and shuffled back to my room.  I wondered if Dorothy was watching through the peephole of hers as I moved past.  I doubted Howard would care where I went barefoot in this fancy place, but Dorothy?  I wouldn’t put it past her to be spying on me.  But then, that was her job.  Everything I did was her responsibility because I’d signed that fucking contract.

But if I hadn’t signed it — if I’d chosen a version that had left me free to pursue men in public — would Howard have sent me to Bloom’s?  Or would I have ended up touring backwater rodeos to rack up points for the championship circuit?  If that had happened, I never would have met Trowa.  I would have met — and maybe fucked — dozens of men but not one of them would have been Trowa.  There was no one like him in the whole damn world.

If I’d never met him—

Oh, Jesus.  Just the thought of it hurt like Sandrock had kicked me in the chest again.  The pain was even worse than imagining how mortified and repulsed my family would be to learn through the rodeo grapevine that I was gay.

God.  Some days, I wished Howard really would fill my schedule up for eighteen hours straight because this kind of introspective shit was what happened when I was clearly not exhausted enough.

I made it to my room and reached for my key.  A bit further down, the emergency exit to the service stairwell opened and a bellboy ducked into the hall.  I didn’t pay much attention.  I went ahead and shouldered the door open and tried to convince myself that a hot shower would help.  I’d bundle up in the extra blankets and tell myself that it felt as good as that single, solitary hug Trowa had given me the day after Shinigami had nearly trampled him.

As far as gestures of gratitude went, that had been really, really good.  Hell, it had been the first and only time in my life that I’d been given a full embrace by a man.  Not even my granddaddy had ever hugged—

“Excuse me, Duo Maxwell?”

The quiet inquiry surprised me, pushing back my heartsick musings.  For that fact alone, whoever it was deserved my appreciation.

I turned.  It was the bellboy.  “Yeah?”

His voice lowered, “I have something for you.  I was told to deliver it when you were alone.”

I had never felt so alone.  And I was as alone as I could expect to be for the time being.  I nodded.  “Who’s it from?”

“I don’t know.  Tall guy.  Brown hair, bangs in his face.  Green eyes.  Well, at least one green eye.”

I stopped breathing.

“You know him?”

“Yeah.  You saw him?”

“This afternoon.”

Oh-my-sweet-Jesus.  “What did he say?  What is it?”

He handed over a fat, wrinkled envelope.  I tore it open and a seventy-nine-cent bag of Reese’s Pieces slid out into my palm.  I felt tears gather in my eyes.  Quickly, I stuffed the candy back in the envelope.  Just in case Dorothy had a line of sight.

“Mister Maxwell?”

“Just— just hold on, um, a moment,” I stuttered, flustered and flushed and falling in love with Trowa Barton all over again.  I explained to the hovering bellboy, “I don’t have my wallet on me.”  I dived into the room and grabbed it off the desk.  The first bill my fingers gripped was a fifty.  I threw the door back open, startling the poor fella.

I quizzed him quietly, “Is he comin’ back?”

“Yeah.  Tomorrow.”

“What time?”

He told me.  I gave him the fifty.  “When you see him, tell him I’m comin’ for the rest of ‘em.  Monday.  Five o’clock p.m.”

He nodded, wide-eyed.  “Th-thanks.”

I made him repeat the message and confirm the meeting time.

Then I placed a call to the cantina from my room.  Dorothy could fucking deal with the fact that I’d placed an overpriced long distance call to talk to some friends and let them wish me luck.

Cathy answered.  She sounded tired at first — it was after midnight after all — but then smug when I told her that I’d just gotten a message from Trowa right here in my hotel courtesy of the bellboy.

She laughed and informed me, “Yes.  He’s at the arena.  His camper’s in Lot E.  When you’re ready, he’ll give you a ride home.”

Oh, God.  How could I love him even more than I already did?  I’d just about tripped over it when I’d opened up the envelope, and I was damn near choking on it now.  I needed a moment before I could force the words out.  “Jesus.  I don’t deserve him.”

“He’s very special,” Cathy agreed.  And then she baffled me by saying, “Thank you, Duo.”

“For what?”

“For seeing it.  For helping him believe it.  You’ve done in a couple of months what all the rest of us haven’t been able to manage in years.”

What could I say to that?

Luckily, she didn’t seem to be waiting for a response.  “I’ll tell him you called.”

I rallied, “Wait!  Tell him Monday at five p.m.  I’ll be there.”

“You got it.  Now the rest of your fans want a word.”  The phone creaked as she angled it around and I heard no less than six voices holler “Good luck!” at me.  I could imagine them all leaning in around the receiver, shoulder to shoulder.  My rodeo family.

“Thanks, y’all!” I shouted back.  Then I hung up.  I opened the bag of candies and told myself I’d make them last… if I could find a good hiding place for them that housekeeping wouldn’t stumble across or Dorothy couldn’t find.

The first sweet, peanut butter flavored piece hit my tongue.  Melted.

Hell yes.  This was a much better way to spend my night.  But I still wrapped myself up in that damn blanket.

In fact, I may just have drifted off to sleep with a smile on my face for the first time in months.

The next day, I made it to the hotel lobby just in time.  Hell, nothing — not even a meeting with the President of the United States of America — would have kept me away from that window and the view I desperately needed to—

Oh, God.  There he was.

He was really here.

I leaned against the window casing as I watched him walk down the hotel drive.  Then he stopped, stiffened, and turned.  Scanned the hotel grounds and then the building itself almost as if he could sense that he was being watched.

Well.  He was.  By the time his gaze found me, I was smiling my fool ass off.

He smiled back, then I watched him walk away.  Back to the arena.  Lot E.  To wait for me.

How in the hell did I deserve this?  What had I ever done in my life to deserve him?

I had no idea.

But I wasn’t gonna give him up without a fight.  I had no idea how we were gonna make this work.  I had to go home — I had to.  But the guys, his family, and his work was at Bloom’s.  One of us was gonna have to make some serious sacrifices if—

If?

No.  This wasn’t an “if” kind of deal.  We’d figure it all out _when_  it came up.  We’d figure it out.  If he could figure out a way to smuggle contraband candy up to my room in a hotel that I hadn’t even known I’d be staying at, past Howard and Dorothy both, then I could figure out a way to be with him.

Though, if I ended up bull riding at Bloom’s again, I sure as shit wasn’t gonna be signing the same fucking contract with Howard a second time.  I’d proven myself; any number of managers would probably be willing to hunt up sponsors on my behalf, but…

But I was ready to be done with the bulls.  I just… when I looked inward, I couldn’t find the need anymore.

Maybe I could work at the cantina instead.  I’d gotten pretty good at beverage service.  Would the tips be good enough to send home?  I doubted it.

Well.  Regardless, there was a solution out there.  We just had to find—

“Duo!” Dorothy scolded me as she marched smartly across the lobby, her stiletto heels clicking against the polished stone tiles.  “Did you get lost on your way back from the men’s room?”

“Nope,” I readily admitted.  The hotel drive was empty; Trowa had long since turned the corner and disappeared from sight, so I could snark all I liked: “Thought I’d practice peein’ for distance.  Seein’ as how that seems to be the direction today’s damn meeting is headed in.”

Dorothy barked out a laugh that turned into a breathy giggle.  The guy at the front desk looked up from the work he was pretending to do and gaped as she flipped a hand through her long hair.  The pale strands pret’near twinkled in the sunlight.  “Oh, please.  I could beat all of you.”

I didn’t doubt it.

“Back to work, rodeo star.”

“Yes, ma’am.”  I gave her a smart salute and smirk.  I’d let her order me around.  I’d let her _enjoy_ ordering me around, but come Monday, five p.m. I was done.

On Monday at five p.m., my life was finally gonna start.  My life with Trowa.  That’s what I was gonna ride for tomorrow.

Tomorrow, I might come in first or last, but it wasn’t gonna matter.  Trowa was gonna be waiting for me either way.

I reckoned that meant I’d already won.  Both of us had.

**Author's Note:**

> So, I wrote this mainly because I wanted to compare and contrast Duo and Trowa regarding the reasons for not starting anything romantic while Duo was bull riding. (But I couldn't figure out where to put it in "Rodeo and Ranch," so we have a companion fic.)
> 
> Both men agree that a one-night stand would not be enough. 
> 
> Trowa accepts that Duo can’t risk losing the money his family needs and he accepts that this is Duo’s choice, which he’s determined to respect. Only later (Chapter 6) does he realize that just sex would not be emotionally satisfying for him. 
> 
> Duo, on the other hand, is concerned that sneaking around would disrespect Trowa and Duo believes that Trowa deserves more than infrequent, furtive moments, which would not be emotionally satisfying for Duo. 
> 
> So, they kind of start out at different points, but luckily they end up at the same destination. Eventually. Yay!


End file.
